The snow of Christmas 1994 had not yet completely melted when the New Year’s Day of 1995 arrived, treading on a scattering of shattered jade and pearls. The cedars on campus still bore the remnants of festive string lights, and the small shop’s New Year cards were piled high like small hills. Students, rubbing eyes exhausted by holiday revelry, welcomed the first ray of New Year light in the morning mist.
Meanwhile, Chén Zhāoyáng’s laboratory was bright as day. The twenty-four-hour air conditioning kept the dead of winter outside the windows, while the clatter of keyboards and the humming of oscilloscopes wove a dense net that filtered this special day down to nothing more than the sheen of code.
When Lín Xiǎotáng pushed open the laboratory door right at the stroke of twelve noon, the steam rising from her thermos flask fogged up her glasses. Groping around to put down her lunchbox, she heard Chén Zhāoyáng’s voice emerge from the forest of servers: "Xiǎotáng, put the hot and sour soup in the third cabinet on the left. I’ll be right there as soon as I finish writing this algorithm."
Chapter 123